Wendy Chapter 5 Mrs. P re-enactment
Monday and Tuesday passed without incident. I avoided Sandy and Benney. Or rather, I avoided seeking them out. My first encounter with Benney had been a chance meeting but other contacts with both he and Sandy had been initiated by me.
On Wednesday I ran ‘butt heads’ into Sandy. I had a habit of walking with my head down when I had something on my mind. Sandy must have spotted me and decided to make me notice her. I suspect her tough little head bouncing off of mine was no accident. Especially since she had to jump up three inches to make it happen.
She tried to look surprised. Her mouth flew open and she rubbed her head but her opening speech gave her away. The head butt was intentional.
“Was the meeting with your lawyer a serious emergency?” Her dark eyes sparkled. I searched her face for that cute smile but it did not appear.
“I’m sorry, it came up all of a sudden.” It was feeble. I had not put much effort into the apology and we both knew it.
“See you around,” her hair swirled as she turned. We both knew better.
That evening the telephone rang while I was studying. I almost knew it would be Wendy as I had still not told her of my ‘phone restrictions.
“What was she wearing?” That habit of bursting into a conversation with a question was becoming annoying.
“She?” I asked knowing whom she was referring to.
“Mrs. P of course.”
“Her name is Lydia, let’s not call her Mrs. P any more,” I said looking at the open books on the table.
“You know that’s not her real name.” Her voice rose at ‘know’ and faded to the raspy sound at ‘real’. A trait I found sexy. I turned off the dining area light and moved to the couch.
“It’s the name she told me to use when I visited her that rainy Saturday night,” I lied. Her given name really started with an L and her last name was Patton. The Patton family was prominent in our town. What if Wendy put it together at some future time? After, say, she got mad at me? I was breaking Ellen’s rule; I was treading on treacherous terrain.
“Let’s call her Lydia, okay?”
“Okay, she’s your lady friend. It sounded as if it was a dress she was wearing? What color was it? What else? What did her panties look like?”
“Blue,” I answered in a playful mood.
“You always say that,” ‘al-ways’ was emphasized with ‘ways’ drawn out in the course rasp that made chills run down my spine.
“I know your trial technique. Is that how you will treat people when you get them on the stand? Fire one question after another at them? From now on, don’t ask me what color something is, I’m color blind.”
“Tell me in your own words then.”
“The pants were plain cotton, probably white, it was dark but I think they were white,” I began coarsely. “Yes, it was a dress and I believe it really was blue but dark blue, darker than navy, almost black. There was a white pattern, like little squares and it had white buttons all the way down the front. I know you’re going to ask what size the buttons were; they were big, about one inch in diameter. Oh, the material was silky but not silk. What did I miss?”
‘Nothing,’ I thought. I had missed nothing about the dress because I knew it like one of my shirts. She wore it that often. She wore it because of the silky feel against her skin. She wore it because there were 13 buttons that often tried my patients by prolonging the suspense. She wore it because it fit loosely and could easily be slipped on in an emergency or could simply be lifted if we were in a rush.
“Bra?”
“Yes, she was wearing a bra but nothing special. I knew it was there but didn’t get to it.”
“What do you mean by that, didn’t get to it?”
“I didn’t try to get under it. I just felt it with my lips when she was feeling the back of my head.”
“Humm,” Wendy contemplated her next question. As her witness on the stand I waited expectantly, “no slip?”
“Humm,” I mimicked her. “Not that I saw.”
“How could you see, I thought it was dark?” The ever wary trial lawyer had me cornered. And she was doing it again; the way ‘dark’ rolled off her tongue made me close my eyes and picture how her lips would look as she spoke; open enough to show the white even teeth behind them. I imagined that she was laying flat on the love seat. I wanted to ask if that was her position and what she was wearing but didn’t.
“Figure of speech; I didn’t feel one; that’s what I meant.”
“Was it a dress or a dressing gown?” I was tiring of her line of questioning.
“God, what difference does it make? I would say it was a house dress; something a women throws on to lounge around the house. But I’ll tell you one thing.” I had just thought of something that might satisfy her.
“What,” she said as if I had just stumbled onto the lost key to her jewell box.
“It was loose fitting. The way it hovered around her crotch when she sat on that box. You know it had to be loose fitting to allow her to spread her legs.” I felt like the expert witness whose testimony would sway the jury. I pictured her turning to the judge to say ‘the defense rests’. She did.
“Good bye,” she said as the line went dead.
It was six minutes to eleven. I closed my books and turned out the kitchen light. It was no use going to bed; I knew I would not sleep.
I thought of that raining Saturday night. Wendy had not shown interest in the story. Nor had she wanted to hear of my other experiences with Ellen during her visit that week before Christmas two years before. Wendy, I decided, was strictly a first timer.